@MaleGoddess @matrix this. We looked into getting solar at one point and did all the calculations about power consumption and even with overly generous projections it would have actually cost us as much to pay for the panels as our usual electrical cost would have been otherwise. Couple that with the fact that the panels have a limited shelf life and that the company offering you the warranty on them will close up shop if the subsidies ever dry up and it would have been a terrible idea.
@MaleGoddess @matrix Oh they are recyclable; it's just not very straightforward (you have to basically break them down and treat them like raw ore, no easier way) and – it's way cheaper to just let the Chinese do the extraction and trash the spent solar cells.
That said, majority of solars on the market are not made with rare earths at all – it's just high-grade crystalline silicon. Cheap, simple, not very efficient, but does the trick.
That said, majority of solars on the market are not made with rare earths at all – it's just high-grade crystalline silicon. Cheap, simple, not very efficient, but does the trick.
@matrix Let's see how this solar power will work out after Bill Gates tries to spray chalk around Earth's atmosphere.
Solar is a scam.
They last about 10 years, so by the time they save enough money to be worth it, you have to replace them.
They're non-recyclable, so into the landfill they go.
To top it off, all of the rare earth elements that are necessary to make them come from China, and China doesn't give a fuck about the environment, there's no EPA there. They dump all of the chemicals from extracting the rare earth elements straight into their waterways, killing all the plant life, animals, and even people downstream.
So even though you're saving the planet on your property, the toll on the environment is 10x worse elsewhere.